TORONTO - Premier Kathleen Wynne has a lot of political baggage to carry as she travels the province in her first election campaign as leader of the governing Liberals.

She inherited the troubles of her predecessor Dalton McGuinty: a criminal probe in the questionable business dealings of the province's Ornge air ambulance service, the cancellation of two unpopular gas plants at a cost of up to $1.1 billion and a police investigation into the deletion of documents, and potentially unsafe girders installed in a parkway in Windsor that the government didn't disclose for months.

Asked whether that controversial legacy will loom large over the Liberals' effort to win a fourth mandate, Wynne said she's brought transparency and openness to the job since she was sworn in as premier more than year ago.

What voters should consider is the budget her government proposed — which includes a proposed pension plan and billions in public transit funding — "that I know is in the best interests of the people of the province," she said last week after announcing a June 12 election.

"The thing I'm most concerned about is that we have the opportunity to implement that plan," she said. "That's how I'm going into this election period and I look forward to talking about that plan with people across the province."

Wynne, 60, became Ontario's first woman premier and Canada's first openly gay provincial leader when she took office on Feb. 11, 2013. But her position hasn't been ratified by voters.

Born in Toronto, Kathleen O'Day Wynne married Phil Cowperthwaite in 1977 and moved to the Netherlands for a few years before returning to Canada. She has a son and two daughters as well as three grandchildren.

Wynne came out as a lesbian at age 37 and married Jane Rounthwaite — whom she'd first met in university about 30 years prior — in 2005.

She was first elected to the legislature in 2003 after serving as a Toronto school trustee and running her own company as a conflict mediation professional.

Wynne said she made the jump to provincial politics because she wanted to defeat a Conservative government that had slashed spending and pushed ahead with controversial changes to public services that sparked widespread labour unrest and sometimes violent demonstrations.

She took on important portfolios under McGuinty, serving as minister of aboriginal affairs, municipal affairs, transportation and education.

Her reputation as a conciliator was part of her appeal during the leadership contest, a skill she's used to mend fences with public school teachers angry over wage-freeze legislation and rural communities upset over decisions to cancel the slots-at-racetracks program and the installation of industrial wind turbines.

She also managed to pass one budget by tailoring it to satisfy the New Democrats, who now say they can no longer support such a scandal-plagued government.

Though she used to invoke McGuinty's name frequently during her run for the leadership, it barely passes her lips now.

"I am Kathleen Wynne and I am running in this election against Andrea Horwath of the NDP and Tim Hudak of the Progressive Conservatives and the other parties that are involved," she said.

"And I am taking on this challenge because I believe we have the best team and the best plan for the people of this province."

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5 Key Ontario Liberal Scandals

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Ontario voters were able to look past these five scandals when they gave Kathleen Wynne's Liberals a majority government in June, 2014.
(Information courtesy of The Canadian Press)

Ontario's publicly funded air ambulance service has been under fire for almost two years over sky-high salaries, financial irregularities and corruption allegations. A legislative committee has been probing the service's complex structures and pay scales in detail, and opposition parties have been alleging wrongdoing with nearly every revelation. The auditor general has criticized the governing Liberals for failing to oversee Ornge, despite giving it $730 million over five years and allowing it to borrow another $300 million. The Liberals insist Ornge went rogue with a web of for-profit companies and questionable business deals, as well as exorbitant salaries and lavish expenses.

Scandal has swirled around the government's decision to cancel the construction of two Toronto-area gas plants ahead of the 2011 election, in which the government then led by Dalton McGuinty was reduced to minority status. The cancellation costs have now been pegged at $1.1 billion, but opposition parties have accused the Liberals of actively trying to cover up that figure. Ontario's privacy commissioner has concluded that staff working for McGuinty and a former energy minister broke the law by deleting emails pertaining to the project. Ontario Provincial Police are also investigating the document deletions, seizing government computers at both Queen's Park and beyond.

The provincial agency was given a $1-billion budget to develop electronic health records, but wound up building themselves a bad reputation. A lot of the eHealth money went for untendered contracts given to highly paid consultants who then billed taxpayers for additional expenses in a scandal that cost former health minister David Caplan his job. In 2009, the auditor general said the agency had very little progress to show for its efforts, and opposition parties have alleged further financial mismanagement since then.

The government has taken heat for not immediately acting when it learned a $1.4-billion infrastructure project didn't live up to safety standards. The Liberals were told that questionable materials were being used on the support beams on Windsor's Herb Gray Parkway in December 2012, but didn't halt the project until July. More than 500 support beams are being replaced by the project overseer at no cost to the tax payers, but the NDP has accused the Wynne government of trying to cover up the affair and only backing down when threatened with media exposure.

Premier Kathleen Wynne has hailed the 2015 games as a cause for celebration, but opposition parties call it just another scandal. The $1.4-billion budget for the games does not include some key expenses, like the $700 million athletes' village. The government has also come under fire for $7 million worth of bonuses paid out to 64 executives.

UP NEXT: The Many Faces Of Kathleen Wynne

Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynn smiles as she arrives at the Toronto Blue Jays game against the New York Yankees during home opener AL baseball action in Toronto on Friday, April 4, 2014. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Peter Power

Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne, left, and Glen Murray, Minister of Infrastructure, ride the subway while en route to Wynne's speech at the Toronto Region Board of Trade in Toronto Monday, April 14, 2014. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darren Calabrese

Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne attends question period at Queen's Park in Toronto on Tuesday, April 1, 2014. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Chris Young

Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne is shown outside her office at Queen's Park in Toronto on Thursday, March 27, 2014. Wynne has distanced herself from her predecessor, former premier Dalton McGuinty, following police allegations one of his staffers may have committed breach of trust. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Frank Gunn

Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne speaks to supporters and her caucus during the party's annual general meeting in Toronto on Saturday, March 22, 2014. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nathan Denette